Trade & Exchange Commission

HORTICULTURAL GOLD

I was one of two artists commissioned as part of Exeter’s COVID-19 Recovery Plan (led by Exeter Culture, Exeter City Council and the Devon and Exeter Institution) to transform vacant retail units into art spaces.

My installation - a layered three-dimensional wallpaper - responded to the rich and complex legacy of the Exeter Veitch Nursery, and our continuing relationship with tropical plants as objects of curiosity and ornamentation.

While this artwork celebrates the significant impact that the Veitch Nursery had on horticulture in Europe, it also questions how collection and colonialism shape our view of plants to this day. Tropical plants have been seen as decorative objects, as subjects of scientific and pharmaceutical interest, as food sources and even as status symbols, but it is easy to overlook their complex indigenous plant-lore, mythology and ecosystems, and their ongoing importance to the cultures whose connection with them is thousands of years old.

2021